DeVos was born Elisabeth Prince on January 8, 1958. She grew up in Holland, Michigan, the daughter of Elsa (Zwiep) Prince (later, Broekhuizen) and Edgar Prince, a billionaire industrialist.[19][20] Both of her parents are of Dutch ancestry, and her family's original surname was "Prins".[21] Edgar was the founder of Prince Corporation, an automobile parts supplier based in Holland, Michigan.[11][19]

Betsy DeVos's brother, Erik Prince, a former U.S. Navy SEAL officer, is the founder of Blackwater USA, a private military services contractor.[19][34][35] Betsy and Dick DeVos have four grown children, two daughters and two sons: Rick, Elissa, Andrea, and Ryan.[36] Rick works for the Windquest Group[37] as a consultant on urban development.[38]

DeVos (far left) watches First Lady Laura Bush (far right) making a purchase at Franklin Cider Mill. Bush was in Michigan to support DeVos's husband in his gubernatorial campaign.

Since 1982, DeVos has participated in the Michigan Republican Party. She served as a local precinct delegate for the Michigan Republican Party, having been elected for 16 consecutive two-year terms since 1986.[39] She was a Republican National Committeewoman for Michigan between 1992 and 1997,[40] and served as chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party from 1996 to 2000.[41][42] In 2004, the Lansing State Journal described DeVos as "a political pit bull for most of [Gov. Jennifer] Granholm's 16 months in office," and said that if DeVos was not Granholm's "worst nightmare," she was "certainly her most persistent". Bill Ballenger, editor of the newsletter Inside Michigan Politics and a former Republican state senator, called DeVos "a good behind-the-scenes organizer and a good fund raiser" as well as "a true believer in core Republican issues that leave nobody in doubt on where she stands".[43] DeVos resigned the position in 2000. She said in 2000, "It is clear I have never been a rubber stamp... I have been a fighter for the grassroots, and following is admittedly not my strong suit."[44] In 2003, DeVos ran again for party chairman and was elected to the post without opposition.[44]

DeVos personally raised more than $150,000 for the 2004 Bush re-election campaign,[45] and hosted a Republican fundraiser at her home in October 2008 that was headlined by President George W. Bush.[46] During the Bush Administration she spent two years as the finance chairperson for the National Republican Senatorial Committee and worked closely with the Administration on "various projects".[47] The DeVos family has been active in Republican politics for decades, particularly as donors to candidates and the party, giving more than $17 million to political candidates and committees since 1989.[28][48]

The Atlantic noted that DeVos had indicated in a 1997 op-ed that she expects results from her political contributions. "My family is the largest single contributor of soft money to the national Republican Party. I have decided to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence," she wrote. "Now I simply concede the point. They are right."[49] She also stated in the op-ed, "We expect to foster a conservative governing philosophy consisting of limited government and respect for traditional American virtues…We expect a return on our investment; we expect a good and honest government. Furthermore, we expect the Republican Party to use the money to promote these policies and, yes, to win elections."[50]

Betsy and her husband Dick are chief investors in and board members of Neurocore, a group of brain performance centers offering biofeedback therapy for disorders such as depression, attention deficit disorder, autism, and anxiety.[54][55][56] The therapy consists of showing movies to patients and interrupting them when they become distracted, in an effort to retrain their brains. According to The New York Times, a review of Neurocore's claims and interviews with medical experts suggest that the company's conclusions are unproven and its methods questionable.[54] Democratic senators raised concerns about a potential conflict of interest and questioned whether she and her family members would "benefit financially from actions" she could take as education secretary. DeVos announced that she would step down from the company's board but would retain her investment in the company, valued at $5 million to $25 million.[54][57][58]

Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University, said he was Trump's initial pick, but he rejected the offer.[59] On November 23, 2016, it was announced that DeVos was President-elect Trump's choice to be the next United States Secretary of Education. Upon her nomination, DeVos said "I am honored to work with the President-elect on his vision to make American education great again. The status quo in ed is not acceptable."[14] DeVos's nomination was generally criticized by teachers unions and praised by supporters of school choice.[60]

Former presidential candidates Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney respectively called DeVos an "outstanding pick" and a "smart choice".[63][64] Republican Senator Ben Sasse said DeVos "has made a career out of standing up to powerful and connected special interests on behalf of poor kids who are too often forgotten by Washington". In an opinion editorial, The Chicago Tribune wrote that "DeVos has helped lead the national battle to expand education opportunities for children".[65]

Prior to DeVos's confirmation, numerous senators from both parties reported tens of thousands of their constituents having contacted their offices in opposition to the confirmation of DeVos.[77] More than 300 state lawmakers from across the U.S., overwhelmingly Democrats, voiced their opposition to DeVos's appointment in a letter to the U.S. Senate sent the day before a scheduled vote on her nomination.[78] DeVos's nomination was supported by 18 Republican governors, including John Kasich and Rick Snyder, along with the nine Republican members of Congress from Michigan.[79]

Vice President Mike Pence breaks the 50–50 tie in the Senate in DeVos's favor, confirming DeVos as Secretary of Education

On January 31, DeVos's nomination was approved by the committee on a 12–11 party-line vote and was due to be voted on by the Senate.[15] Later on February 1, 2017, two Republican senators, Susan Collins (Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), came out against the confirmation (despite supporting DeVos in the Senate education committee when both of them voted 'yes' to approve her nomination),[80] bringing the predicted confirmation vote on DeVos to 50–50 if all Democrats and independents voted as expected, meaning Vice President Mike Pence would have to break the tie.[81] During an unusually early 6:30 a.m. vote on February 3, 2017, cloture was invoked on DeVos's nomination in the Senate, requiring a final vote on the confirmation to happen after 30 hours of debate.[82]

Ahead of the scheduled final vote at noon on February 7, 2017, the Democrats in the Senate continuously spoke on the floor against the confirmation of DeVos the entire night before leading up to the vote, in protest of their strong disapproval of the nominee.[83] As expected, there was a 50–50 tie on the final vote, with all Democrats and independents, along with two Republicans (Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski), voting in opposition to DeVos, while the other fifty Republican senators voted in support of the confirmation, including Senator Jeff Sessions, who himself had been nominated by the Trump administration for the post of United States Attorney General. Republicans scheduled Sessions's confirmation vote after DeVos's so that he would be able to cast his vote in support of DeVos. Had his confirmation vote been earlier than hers, he would have been forced to resign from the Senate, therefore losing a vital vote for the Republicans on the confirmation.[84][85][86]
Since there was a tie, Vice PresidentMike Pence had to step in to decide the vote as the President of the Senate.[87] He cast his tie-breaking vote in favor of DeVos to officially confirm her as education secretary.[88] This was the first tie decided by a vice president on any vote in the Senate since the George W. Bush administration.[89][90]

On February 10, 2017, as DeVos made a visit to Jefferson Academy, a public middle school located in Southwest, Washington, D.C., in her first official appearance as Secretary at a D.C. public school, dozens of protesters showed up to prevent her appearance and physically blocked her from entering through the back entrance of the school. DeVos was eventually able to enter the school through a side entrance.[91][92][93]

On February 27, 2017, DeVos released a statement calling historically black colleges "real pioneers when it comes to school choice", causing controversy as some pointed out the schools originated after segregation laws prevented African-Americans from attending others. DeVos later acknowledged racism as an important factor in the history of historically black colleges.[94]

On March 24, 2017, during a visit to the Osceola County campus of Valencia College, DeVos said she was considering the extension of federal financial aid for students that were year-round and interested in placing more focus on community colleges.[95]

On March 29, 2017, DeVos delivered her first extended policy address at the Brookings Institution, stating an interest in implementing choice policies directed toward children as individuals and criticizing the Obama administration's additional funding of $7 billion for the U.S.'s worst performing schools as "throwing money at the problem" in an attempt to find a solution.[96]

On April 6, 2017, DeVos visited Florida International University, marking her first visit to a public university, where she toured an area designed to resemble a hospital ward and was confronted by around 30 protestors.[97] The following day, the U.S. Marshals Service said after a threat evaluation was conducted in February that DeVos would be given additional security, projecting a cost of $7.8 million between February and September.[98]

On April 11, 2017, DeVos undid several Obama administration policy memos issued by John King Jr. and Ted Mitchell in an attempt to "create a student loan servicing environment that provides the highest quality customer service and increases accountability and transparency for all borrowers, while also limiting the cost to taxpayers".[99]

In April 2017, DeVos named Candice Jackson Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Department's Office for Civil Rights, where she will be acting Assistant Secretary while that higher, Senate-confirmed appointment is vacant.[101] DeVos named Jason Botel Deputy Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education.[101] Botel, a registered Democrat who supported President Obama and the Black Lives Matter movement, founded the KIPP Ujima Village Academy in Baltimore, after working for Teach For America.[101]

On May 22, 2017, DeVos announced the Trump administration was offering "the most ambitious expansion" of school choice within American history. DeVos cited Indiana (which has the U.S.'s largest school voucher program) as a potential model for a nationwide policy, but did not give specific proposals.[103] In a May 2017 House of Representatives committee hearing, Rep. Katherine Clark, said an Indiana private school which takes publicly funded vouchers maintains it is entitled to deny admission to LGBT students or those coming from families with "homosexual or bisexual activity." Clark asked if she would inform Indiana that it could not discriminate in that way if it accepted federal funding, and asked her how she would respond in the event a voucher school rejected black students but a state "said it was okay." DeVos answered: "Well again, the Office of Civil Rights and our Title IX protections are broadly applicable across the board, but when it comes to parents making choices on behalf of their students. . ." Clark stopped her saying, "This isn't about parents making choices, this is about the use of federal dollars. Is there any situation? Would you say to Indiana, that school cannot discriminate against LGBT students if you want to receive federal dollars? Or would you say the state has the flexibility?" DeVos responded: "I believe states should continue to have flexibility in putting together programs. . ."[104] CBS reporter Lesley Stahl questioned her, in a March 2018 "60 Minutes" interview, about the documented failure of the DeVos programs to demonstrate a positive result, in Michigan, her home state: “Your argument that if you take funds away that the schools will get better is not working in Michigan...where you had a huge impact and influence over the direction of the school system.” Stahl added, “The public schools here are doing worse than they did.” DeVos was unable to provide any actual examples of improvement, but stated there were “pockets” where schools had done better than public schools.[105]

On June 2, 2017, DeVos announced her support of President Trump's decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement the prior day.[106]

On June 6, 2017, Devos said states' rights would determine private schools being allocated funds by the federal government during an appearance before members of a House appropriations committee.[107]

On July 6, 2017, Democratic attorneys general in 18 states and Washington D.C., led by Massachusetts's A.G. Maura Healey, filed a federal lawsuit against DeVos for suspending the implementation of rules that were meant to protect students attending for-profit colleges. The rules, developed during the Obama administration, were meant to take effect on July 1, 2017.[108][109]

On July 13, 2017, Candice Jackson, who is a sexual assault survivor, organized a meeting with DeVos, college sexual assault victims, accused assailants, and higher education officials, and said she would look at policies on sexual assault accusations on campuses from the Obama administration to see if accused students were treated within their rights.[110] Asked by CBS60 Minutes reporter Lesley Stahl about her repeal of Obama administration guidelines for colleges dealing with reports of sexual assaults, she said her concern was for men falsely accused of such assaults. "Survivors, victims of a lack of due process, and campus administrators have all told me that the current approach does a disservice to everyone involved," said DeVos.
[111][104]

In January 2018, Devos said in a speech that the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) found that "60 percent of its teachers reported having moderate to no influence over the content and skills taught in their own classrooms." In response, AFT noted that in the same survey of around 5000 educators, 86% felt that Devos had disrespected them.[113]

In March 2018, DeVos announced a School Safety Commission, to provide meaningful and actionable recommendations. Members were four Cabinet members, including herself.[114] The organization held a meeting on March 28 and a gathering of school shooting survivors and families on April 17.[115]

In mid-May 2018, The New York Times reported that under DeVos, the size of the team investigating abuses and fraud by for-profit colleges was reduced from about twelve members under the Obama administration to three, with their task also being scaled back to "processing student loan forgiveness applications and looking at smaller compliance cases". DeVos also appointed Julian Schmoke as the team's new supervisor; Schmoke was a former dean of DeVry Education Group, which was one of the institutions the team had been investigating. The investigation into DeVry was not the only one stopped, others include those of Bridgepoint Education and Career Education Corporation. The Education Department has hired more ex-employees and people affiliated with those institutions, such as Robert S. Eitel, senior counselor to DeVos, Diane Auer Jones, an advisor to the Department, and Carlos G. Muñiz, the Department’s general counsel.[116] Also reported by several news outlets was a sequence of payments made by DeVry to the DeVos Foundation.

In late May 2018, Devos said that she believed it was "a school decision" on whether to report a student's family to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if the student or their family are undocumented immigrants. However, under Plyler v. Doe, the American Supreme Court ruled under the American constitution, schools are obligated to provide schooling irrespective of immigration status. The American Civil Liberties Union has said that because of this, it would be unconstitutional for schools to report students or their families to ICE.[117]

The Dick & Betsy DeVos Family Foundation was launched in 1989.[119][120] The foundation's giving, according to its website, is motivated by faith, and "is centered in cultivating leadership, accelerating transformation and leveraging support in five areas", namely education, community, arts, justice, and leadership.[121] In 2015, the DeVos Foundation made $11.6 million in charitable contributions, bringing the couple's lifetime charitable giving to $139 million.[122]Forbes ranked the DeVos family No. 24 on its 2015 list of America's top givers.[123]

With respect to educational-focused donations, the foundation from 1999 to 2014 supported private Christian schools (at least $8.6 million), charter schools ($5.2 million), and public schools ($59,750).[126] Specific donations included $2.39 million to the Grand Rapids Christian High School Association, $652,000 to the Ada Christian School, and $458,000 to Holland Christian Schools.[124][126]

When DeVos was appointed US Education Secretary, it was revealed that she was an elder at Mars Hill Bible Church.[130] During her tenure, she reportedly donated $431,000 to the church between 2002 and 2004 and $453,349 to Flannel, producer of the NOOMA video series.[131][132]

DeVos was appointed by President George W. Bush to the board of directors of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2004, and served until 2010. While she was on the board, she and her husband funded a center to teach arts managers and boards of directors how to fundraise and manage their cultural institutions.[134][135] The couple donated $22.5 million in 2010 to continue the endeavor, which was given in the name of the DeVos Institute of Arts Management.[134][135]

After the announcement of the DeVoses' gift to the Kennedy Center, DeVos explained that she had been persuaded by Kennedy Center official Michael Kaiser's observation that millions of dollars are invested "in the arts, and training artists", but not in "training the leaders who hire the artists and run the organizations". The DeVoses' gift was intended to remedy this oversight. "We want to help develop human capital and leverage that capital to the greatest extent possible", she said, describing Kaiser's "practice and approach" as "practical, realistic and creative".[135] The DeVoses' gift, part of which would be spent on arts groups in Michigan that had been hit hard by the recession, was the largest private donation in the Kennedy Center's history.[136]

In 2009, Betsy DeVos's son Rick DeVos founded ArtPrize, an international art competition held in Grand Rapids, Michigan. As of 2016 approximately 16 percent of ArtPrize's $3.5 million annual budget was provided by various foundations run by the DeVos family, with the rest provided by other foundations and local and national businesses.[137][36]

DeVos in 2001 listed education activism and reform efforts as a means to "advance God's Kingdom".[3][4] In an interview that year, she also said that "changing the way we approach ... the system of education in the country ... really may have greater Kingdom gain in the long run".[3]

DeVos believes education in the United States should encourage the proliferation of charter schools and open up private schools to more students via financial assistance programs, often called vouchers, and she has stated that education is "a closed system, a closed industry, a closed market. It's a monopoly, a dead end."[138] DeVos believes that opening up the education market will offer parents increased choice, a view that critics call a drive to privatize the American public education system.[138]

DeVos is known as a "a fierce proponent of school vouchers" that would allow students to attend private schools with public funding.[139] According to The New York Times, it "is hard to find anyone more passionate about the idea of steering public dollars away from traditional public schools than Betsy DeVos".[63]

DeVos served as chairwoman of the board of Alliance for School Choice.[140] Until November 2016,[141] she headed the All Children Matter PAC which she and her husband founded in 2003 to promote school vouchers, tax credits to businesses that give private school scholarships, and candidates who support these causes.[142] Over the years, DeVos and her husband have provided millions in funding for the organization. In 2008, All Children Matter was fined $5.2 million in Ohio for illegally laundering money into political campaign funds.[143][144] DeVos was not named in the case.[145] The fine remained unpaid as of 2017, prompting calls by Democratic Party lawmakers for DeVos to settle the debt.[146][147]

Her other activities on behalf of public-school reform have included membership on the boards of directors of the Advocates for School Choice, the American Education Reform Council, and the Education Freedom Fund.[148] She has chaired the boards of Choices for Children, and Great Lakes Education Project (GLEP).[149]

DeVos was chair of the American Federation for Children (AFC).[150] Affiliated with the Alliance for School Choice, the AFC describes itself as "a leading national advocacy organization promoting school choice, with a specific focus on advocating for school vouchers and scholarship tax credit programs".[151]

During the 1990s, she served on the boards of Children First America and the American Education Reform Council, which sought to expand school choice through vouchers and tax credits. She and her husband worked for the successful passage of Michigan's first charter-school bill in 1993,[22] and for the unsuccessful effort in 2000 to amend Michigan's constitution to allow tax-credit scholarships or vouchers. In response to that defeat, DeVos started a PAC, the Great Lakes Education Project, which championed charter schools. DeVos's husband and John Walton then founded All Children Matter, a political organization, which she chaired.[152]

DeVos has been an advocate for the Detroit charter school system. Douglas N. Harris, professor of economics at Tulane University, wrote in a 2016 The New York Times op-ed that DeVos was partly responsible for "what even charter advocates acknowledge is the biggest school reform disaster in the country". In the National Assessment of Educational Progress, Detroit had the lowest reading and mathematics scores "by far" over any city participating in the evaluation. According to Harris, she designed a system with no oversight in which schools that do poorly can continue to enroll students.[153]

Ramesh Ponnuru of National Review argued that Harris overstates the failure of charter schools in Detroit. According to Ponnuru, the study referenced by Harris, the National Assessment of Educational Progress, did "not sound nearly as helpful to Harris's case as he suggests". Ponnuru pointed out that the study says "some 47 percent of charter schools in Detroit significantly outperform[ed] traditional public schools in reading and 49 percent of charters significantly outperforming traditionals on math. Only one percent of charters were significantly outperformed by traditional public schools in reading and only 7 percent on math."[154] Also defending DeVos's record in Michigan, Jay P. Greene, professor of education policy at the University of Arkansas, argued that Harris's The New York Times article misled readers on the evidence and "falsely claimed that Detroit has failed to close failing charter schools", noting that Detroit has closed more charters than Louisiana, a state Harris cites as a model for charter school legislation.[155]

In a written response to a question about charter school performance posed during DeVos's confirmation hearing by Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), asking "why do you think their performance is so poor?", DeVos defended the charter school system using graduation rates that were significantly higher than those used for state and federal accountability purposes. DeVos provided examples of several charter schools that she said had 4-year graduation exceeding 90%. These examples were contested by Columbia University professor Aaron Pallas and Education Week reporter Ben Herold on the basis that the actual graduation rates were roughly only half as large as DeVos had stated.[156][157]

DeVos and Joel Klein said in a May 2013 op-ed that residents of Maine "are now given information on school performance using easy-to-understand report cards with the same A, B, C, D and F designations used in student grades". This system, they argued, "truly motivates parents and the community to get involved by simply taking information that education officials have had for years and presenting it in a way that is more easily understood."[158]

The DeVoses have also established an annual scholarship, called the Betsy and Dick DeVos Scholars for Free Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Scholarship, which is awarded to students earning a BBA or combined BBA/MBA at Northwood University.[159]

^Scahill, Jeremy (2008). Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Arm. Nation Books. ASINB0097CYTYA.Prince, Erik (2014). Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of the War on Terror. Portfolio. ISBN978-1-59184-745-8.